The Misadventures of Jacknife!
by DDshoeshowz
Summary: It appears as if the Warden has something special for his captive audience. And do we mean captive! There's something in store for prisoner Jacknife but what could it be?
1. Caught!

He was currently in an utterly forgettable stop-n-shop centered in an even more bland strip mall that carved the horizon of the suburbanite hell.

Jacknife considered himself a connoisseur of public service. Hadn't he been serving the public behind bars for how many countless times? Hadn't he been in the public service system since those early, oily-faced days of young adolescence when the indulgent life of crime first called to him? Had not his life been in constant service for the people as he so selflessly was placed in the public incarceration system for the greater safety and good of the larger public?

Yes – he had.

So this service – the twenty minutes of waiting (not-so) patiently in line as the cashier and – what had to be – a chronically old fossil of a human being, gaudily bejeweled and (of all things) a chain-smoking Jewish lady haggled over the price of gum that barely broke the dollar mark. _This_ was not customer service. The only reason that he hadn't already pulled out the schiv that bulging in his back pocket and demand that the two _shut up for God's sake!_ was because the cashier, in question, had a great rack. She was just at the age where they were going to get as big as they were meant to (well…at least naturally) and yet the inevitable passage of years hadn't caused them to fall and deflate like two leftover party balloons left to float in the living room until dejectedly resigned to prostrate upon the floor as latex raisin-like rejects.

It was that and the fact that he was planning on grabbing a handful from the take a penny leave a penny fund.

A few pennies slipped from his tight clench and, as they did, an all too familiar boom sounded ahead.

Jailbot.

And then the cold metallic claws snaked their way over his too thin frame. As one curled around his waist, another batting oxidized change out of his grip, and two others looping themselves under his arms and taking hold; he squeezed his eyes shut in expectation of the impending torment. Yet the arms, surprisingly, remained slack – though not dormant. Continually did they snake and curl – oscillating and almost playfully nipping at his clothes as though they were alive and born with the personality of week old puppies.

He was being toyed with. He was the proverbial mouse in the metaphoric vice of the cat.

For some reason, this was more infuriating than any beatdown could have been. Jacknife was a man of his instincts so, logically, he began to thrash about frenzied to shake his opponent off. All action and no finesse. His shoes skidded upon the floor and he reached desperately for the countertop that the cashier now cowered behind and then – whoop – the robot's grip did tighten now and he found himself a few feet higher than he had grown.

"Oh lighten up!" A cheery voice chirped – a sound a few degrees from a melody, ""This isn't going to hurt…well not for too long anyway."

Jacknife was not reassured nor was he able to get anything more than a disgruntled growl before – ah god! – the floor rushed up to meet him and his arms, useless as they were in the given situation, wind milled wildly to gain altitude. Then he was caught again by those cold arms and saved only inches from having his face reorganized on the linoleum by the claws of his very tormenter.

"Why so scared? The voice chimed in again, "I already told you it'd be okay." Then it paused thoughtfully before continuing to remark, "Unless you don't like being manhandled," the voice was full of candy canes and rainbow drops if any a voice could be ,"There's not much that I can do to help _that_."

Though the words were of encouragement, they did not help to abate Jacknife's utterance part screaming and equal parts whimpering.

However this was cut off as he was thrown in the air for what seemed the millionth time over and was rearranged in the robot's tentacular grip so that he finally, fully faced his captor. He recognized the face. It couldn't be helped. Anoyone who had met that face would – to be sure – never forget it.

It was the Warden.

And the Warden was draped over the head of his war-like robot so that he sat piggy-back across the thing so that his well-oiled boots stuck out over the thing and he rest his head upon a gloved hand propped upon Jailbot's own head.

And that head contained the most devious smile possible in pixilated form.


	2. Welcome Home

A/N: I redid this chapter. I wasn't happy with the last one. I'm much more satisfied with this.

* * *

Iron bars. A toe-curling musk. Some_thing_ in the corner.

None of this was new. For Jacknife this was a home away from home. This was Superjail!

He grumbled unintelligibly as he was apt to. For him not to would be quite a surprise; for everything that came out of the petty criminal's mouth was something between a cross of intelligent speech and a base series of grunts.

As disjointed as they were, Jacknife's guttural diatribes were lost in the baseline lull of chatter made by the neighboring cell occupants. And this being Superjail! nothing that came out of these cells were anything akin to normal. In fact, Jacknife was pretty sure that in the cell above him either the occupant was having lunch, or _being_ lunch. There were too many screams from the adjacent rooms however to really discern. Also one could never be sure truly what they were hearing or from where thanks to all the concrete around for the sound waves to bounce off of anyway.

Jacknife's mental rant cut short as he was quite wholly shocked by the display of a basic understanding of sound wave physics. This was especially surprising due to the fact that he had dropped out of the third grade, had never paid attention to anything that could prove in the least to be self-beneficial, and was pretty convinced that it wasn't a subject taught in that grade anyway. The only regret that he had harbored from those early years was the fact that he had missed the onset of fifth grade health classes. In those places, they were giving out for free what he had to buck up for at the street corner for just a bit of flesh! And what he saw was only on the outside! Apparently they were showing those school-grade brats the _insides_ of a girl's hoochy-mamma. Jacknife had no idea what they could possibly look like but apparently girls were full of things called _ovaries_ and a _uterus_. Whatever they were, they sounded important….and hot! Definitely hot.

While he had his mind on the fairer sex (and some things on sex, but not quite so fair) someone else had their mind on something altogether different, "Hey big boy, just got in? Feeling lonely?"

The _thing_ that had previously been content to stay in the bounds of the back corner behind the shroud of shadow that hugged closely to the fringe of circular yellow light bathed from the dying bulb above moved closer, revealing the figure of a man, "I can keep you warm, sugar, if you know what I mean." A tinny little laugh escaped its lips.

Jackknife most certainly knew what he meant. And, as the blood rushed to his face, the adrenaline an electric shock shooting from his toes clenched tight to the hairs stiff upon his tingling scalp; he definitely felt warm enough. In fact, he felt more than warm enough. He was sweating bullets (and in a place such as this he couldn't be sure for how long the metaphor meaning of the term would last before it traversed the plane into psychedelic literal form – another thought equally parts unnerving) and tured to face this newfound occupant. He was _not_ planning on getting caught from behind.

Superjail! never did any weapon checks. The only searches done in Superjail! were of the full body cavity kind. So, in consequence, Jacknife thrust a hand in his jean pocket – a cavernous hole where he was just as likely to find his schiv as he was to find the hypodermic needle he had bought last week. This time he pulled out a stapler: pocket-sized, _Swingline_.

The offender drew closer. Now he could see the veins outlining the bulging muscles that he feared would soon enough pin him down and the mouth stained with a purple gloss that wanted to go places he would rather not know.

Hastily, he drew his make-shift weapon to eye-level in his scrawny outstretched arm.

Now the bulldog-like face drew down to his height as the great mass of body leaned forward. The head seemingly a receptor for stray radio weaves as the well-oiled hair was bunched into off shooting groups of pigtails; as many as could possibly be amassed abroad such a broad canvas of skull. The body to which it melted on – no sign of a neck – was grossly underdressed; this was most certainly an effort to display as much equally well-oiled muscle as possible. He and his aggressor were now eye level. One breadth width apart. In fact, Jacknife could distinguish the faint layers of nicotine, cherry blow-pop, and some indefinable animal musk between the span of slightly asthmatic breaths.

He was screwed. Or more accurately, he was _going_ to be screwed.

Jacknife clamped his eyes shut – not wishing to witness the one-manned massacre. He had one hand up in self-defense to protect his head, features pulled away from the offending sight, and the other pointed straight at his opponet's visage (well, as straight as he could manage in such tight quarters).

He squeezed back upon the cold metal, and then fired.

A staple bounced harmlessly off the meaty face. And then, most surprisingly, a smile cracked the thing into two; the wide grin revealed impeccably white, horrifically perfect cornrow teeth. The face flicked up and away as the great head flew back with laughter. The large, conspicuously hairless chest pulsed up and down to the beat of the man's giddy humor. In fact, everything about this cellmate was great; in the definition of 'unusually or comparatively large in size or dimensions' and not so much in the vein of 'wonderful; first-rate; or very good'.

"I like you," his cellmate shoved a pointed index finger nearly puncturing Jacknife's ribcage, "I really like you," the laughs were now beginning to subside with some success, "I can tell we're going to have some fun."

Fun? For whatever reason – or perhaps every reason – Jacknife thought that whatever would be fun for this guy would be anything but for himself.

"Name's Carl," a meaty hand thrust ready for a kindly shake in return, "But you can call me whatever. You. Like, honey."

Carl had a weird way of talking, Jacknife surmised. He punctuated some words while completely running over others as though they were naught but an afterthought.

"Carl!" A sharp voice ran out above the din, "What did I tell you about harassing new incarnates? We lost two last week because of this!"

"So sor-rey," Carl scuffed a foot upon the tarnished concrete abashedly, "won't happen again, sir."

"It better not." And then the nameless voice appeared. Putting not only a name to it but a face as well. A completely unforgettable face; one Jacknife would be able to pick out from a crowd for the entirety of his years if such a being ever mixed with the mundane world – its narcissism just would not allow.

Sliding from the tail end of a rainbow into a splash of liquid candy-cane sugar, a man clothed in an all too purple trapping of coat, vest, and matching hat slithered upward from the base of his polished oak cane. He whistled an unidentifiable tune - though one purely saturated in cheer through the gap of his two front teeth.

Who could it be than the Warden of course?


End file.
